Love Me Tender, Love Me Lost

Yesterday at the gym while I harnessed my ankle to a pulley system in order to torture my hamstrings and glutes, my attention wandered, as it often does, to the other people working out near me.

I saw a couple who appeared to be working out together, and I watched them take turns using a machine designed for upright rows. At one point, while the woman sat tall and engaged her rhomboids while pulling the handles back, the man tenderly caressed the top of her head.Â

Instantly my thoughts propelled me back to all the myriad times when my beloved tenderly caressed my poor brain tumorâ€™d head. I nearly broke down sobbing right there in the gym, remembering what I once had and what I have lost. I unknowingly threw it away, because I am a terrible Eleanor Shellstrop of a person who could not keep a lid on her shame and instead let it control her into lying to and betraying the one person who ever loved her beyond beyond.

I donâ€™t know how to live with this. I am told that I may never recover what I once had, no matter what I do to repair what I broke. I am just so sad, and so angry at myself for not having the strength to look into the eyes of the person who loved me beyond beyond and to see that there was nothing but acceptance and love there. Instead, I saw mirrored back only the black depths of my self hatred.

And now I am left with the shattered dark remains of what once stood shining so golden and bright. And I donâ€™t know how to go forward.